Tuesday 22 May 2018

For Our Liberty by Rob Griffith

Shortlisted for Book of the Month



AMAZON UK £0.99 £6.99
AMAZON US $1.39 $13.00  
AMAZON CA $1.34 $16.45

The Ben Blackthorne Papers #1

Fictional Saga
1800s


France



This has to be one of the best books I have read for Discovering Diamonds, one that stays in the mind. It is an excellent story written in the compelling style of a rather irreverent memoir, with plenty of vibrant narrative and nice little direct addresses to the reader, bringing you right into the action. 

Ben Blackthorne, the bastard son of an English aristocrat and former lieutenant in His Majesty's Army, is in self-imposed exile in Paris in 1803 when war breaks out once again between England and the old enemy France, a country more and more under the control of Napoleon Bonaparte. Ben is not overly concerned about this, until a fellow military man entrusts him with a packet of paper that has to be taken to England. With the help of Royalists, a beautiful woman called Dominique, and those who just don't like Bonaparte, he is smuggled out of France back to safety in England where he delivers the papers and thinks that is an end to the matter. However, the pull of Dominique is too much and against his better judgement, Ben decides to go back into the lion's den.

Ben is an arresting character; we watch him develop and grow into himself, a hero-in-training, not the finished article, but close to it by the time we leave him. He is filled with self-doubts and a huge black cloud looms large over him, but he finds a way to dispel that as he also finds a use for himself.

Dominique is not a typical female lead, not at all soft or useless; strong, powerful, independent, very modern and real. You have to like her.

To nit-pick - and with books this good you desperately want them to be perfect - the denouement is possibly a bit rushed and lacks the emotional power of other passages. Otherwise the plot works, the structure of the story is good, the characters well drawn and compelling, and the style is wonderful.

© Nicky Galliers



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